"Like Us" by Bambu

Bambu "Like Us" from Xylophone Films on Vimeo.

Katie Couric on Sarah Palin : Get 'em Girl

Katie Couric is one gutsy broad. Much respect to that. And she is quite the witty talking head. Brad Pitt was on Oprah simultaneously and I almost gouged my own eyes out of boredom. This, however, I enjoyed thoroughly.

Bad Economy = People Going Postal

No wonder they let people go on a Friday.



From NBC Bay Area -

Police say they have arrested a 47-year-old man suspected of slaying three of his former co-workers at a Silicon Valley high-tech firm.

Santa Clara Police Lt. Mike Sellers says Jing Hua Wu was arrested without incident in Mountain View on Saturday.

Wu had been missing since the Friday afternoon shootings at the offices of SiPort Inc., a company that develops digital radio semiconductors.

Police say Wu had been let go this week from his job as a product test engineer.

Police identified the victims as Sid Agrawal, SiPort's chief executive officer: Brian Pugh, the company's vice president of operations and Marilyn Lewis.

Wu is being booked into Santa Clara County Jail, where he will be held on three murder counts.

JFAV (Justice for Fil-AM Vets) Veterans Day March

Photo by Chris Rafie

Nude Pics = Boost for ailing (or nonexistent) career

My prediction is that she'll be on the cover of Maxim next month. Maybe I'm old school in thinking that if this ever happened to me, I would be mortified of what my Filipino family would think of me. That's enough to delete any flick I might have taken for my man if, say, he was ever to go on tour and miss me. I'd rather invest in a MacBook with video chat so at least you can show your hoo-ha in real time! But I guess even that would be a troublesome security breach if it were to occur. Anyway, if you're backed by Disney dollars, don't take any nude flicks (Vanessa!). But I suppose with High School Musical still bringing in mucho dinero, and a pre-nudie relatively-obscure to the non-tween Vanessa Hudgens now on the cover of Teen Vogue, I guess it isn't the taboo it once was. I mean look at Kim Kardashian. She's famous for sleeping with Ray-J, for goddsakes (and not doing it well, I might add. Yes, I watched it!).

Anyhow, my heart goes out to these girls who, in the end, have been victimized, but my advice is that your vanity (and lust!) should not outweigh your judgement.

Dramatel: "Almost Illegal" and Pretty Darn Racist

There's something irresistible about watching shows like "Cheaters" or Maury Povich. Sure, they're banking on your miserable lives and lack of judgment but entertainment is the great equalizer - or so we think.

When I first saw this air on the late night tip, I thought it was a joke: A Black couple with the players "Baby's Momma", "T-Money" and "Cheating Boyfriend"? It had to be an exaggerated characterization of relationships in the Black community, and ultimately too tasteless a skit to be for real. Well, it sure is real.

So what is Dramatel? It's a phonecard that allows you to ghost as someone else to catch your partner cheating, even allowing the purchaser to distort their voice and outsmart their target's caller ID. I won't even begin to touch on the kind of relationship you have to have to even consider this short-term solution, and I'm sure we all entertained the thought of using it on someone we're with, but it's the way they promoted their product that I have a problem with.

If you know me, you know I love to dissect RACE and how it is utilized in the media. This is a perfect example. By using a Black couple to perpuetuate the stereotypes of the neck-twisting Black woman and her promiscous Black boyfriend, it shows not only the degradation of the nuclear Black family, but the powerlessness of the Black woman in the relationship. Not to mention he's cheating on her with two scantily-clad white girls!!!

And although Cheaters and Maury show white-trash couples as well, the "paternity test" phenomena is largely fueled by the "Baby Momma" association, which is largely a Black characterization.

Here's a suggestion to Dramatel: please don't market this to a community that is plagued with problems much more significant than cheating spouses. Not only are you perpetuating these "ghetto" stereotypes, but you are taking money away from the 'hood with a product that is not likely to solve lack in judgement (or options).

Why don't you market it to cheating Politicians of the Elliot Spitzer/John Edwards fashion? Not only will you make scores more money, but they'll most likely benefit most from the paper trail switcheroo.


What do you guys think?

Crooks & Rooks Teaser

Bambu "Crooks & Rooks" Teaser from Xylophone Films on Vimeo.

Meet Lucky Day Harris

I bumped into T.I. yesterday at Best Buy and couldn't help but wonder...

Barack Obama Is A Win For Women

via Jezebel

Barack Obama doesn't just represent a win for the women of America in terms of his positions on reproductive choice, health care, pay equity, family leave, comprehensive sex education and subsidized child care — though, arguably, he is definitely that in comparison to the McCain-Palin ticket. He is also a win for women because — more so than ever before — women's votes propelled him to victory. So, first, congratulations, women of America! Now let's look at the numbers.

In 2004, a slim majority of women — 51% — went for John Kerry over George Bush, whereas this year, 56% of women voted for Obama. In fact, this year, fully 53% of all voters were women! Men, on the other hand, split much more evenly: only 49% of men voted for Obama and 48% of men voted for McCain. By any reckoning, women, more than men, propelled Obama to victory. As The Guardian's Sarah Wildman noted yesterday, women weren't remotely swayed by the presence of a woman on the McCain ticket — so maybe politicians will start treating us like we count and pay attention to the issues.

Of course, it must also be said that all women cannot share in this credit equally. Nearly 52% of white women voted for McCain (and 57% of white men did), according to AP exit polls. On the other hand, minority women voted overwhelmingly for Obama, helping all of us keep and expand our rights to reproductive choice, equal pay and equitable health care access. Overall, 95% of African Americans voted for Obama, but 96% of African-American women did so. And nowhere was the gender gap more striking than among Latino voters — two thirds of whom voted for Obama on Tuesday, says MSNBC:

In Colorado, 78 percent of Hispanic women supported Obama, compared to 73 percent of Hispanic men. In New Mexico, the gap was even greater, with 72 percent of Hispanic women favoring Obama, compared to 65 percent of Hispanic men. And in Texas, where voters overall chose McCain, 71 percent of Hispanic women supported Obama, compared to 55 percent of men, a gender gap of 16 points.

Pollsters attribute those large gender gaps in the Latino community to nothing less than Obama's emphasis on heath care and the affordability of education (as well as his outreach efforts).

In fact, one could even argue that if women make great strides toward full equality under an Obama Administration, it will be because minority women had the good sense to turn out in large numbers and help elect a President who will do us all some good. So, on behalf of the white women of America — more than half of whom, apparently, didn't have to good sense to vote for the President committed to expanding all women's rights — thank you, ladies. And, from those of us white women who weren't so foolish as to vote for John McCain, well, we'll try working on our sisters. We've got 4 years.

HHO Artist Of The Week

Congrats to OBAMA. This is only the beginning.

Obama may have won by a landslide, but his campaign and especially that of his opponents McCain and Palin have exposed an ugly side of America that has not been remedied by the Civil Rights Act or the growing diversity of this country.

This is a huge victory for champions of progress, yes, but race in America is still a hotbead of divisiveness. It is not enough to have a Black President. We must address our own prejudices. We must identify and abolish systematic racism present in our public schools and prison industrial complexes. We must teach ACCEPTANCE and not TOLERANCE. And like Obama, we must be confident, hopeful, and fearless in the face of hate-mongering and outright racism.

Please do not be fooled into thinking that "we finally made it." This is a grand leap into the right direction but an even greater opportunity for us to keep pushing forward harder than ever rather than throw our hands behind our heads and kick up our heels.

I hope that we all become less cynical of this process, and, in turn, more likely to become proponents of CHANGE in our own way. Go OBAMA!

Yo-Yo, Raekwon & Doug E. gettin' down

I had the pleasure of seeing this live and the misfortune of having my camera malfunction on me! Good thing I found a much better version of this from the Honey 2-Year Anniversary Party on Hip Hop Official.

Ladies of the Honey Collective (too bad no one else held '88 down like they did!)

The theme was "Dress Like It's 88", and I already knew this was troublesome for a couple of reasons: a.) People mix up the 80s and 90s dress all the time b.) If you dressed to the nines, you might look really dope or really out of place if no one else gets in the spirit c.) People in Hollywood are too cool to "commit" to the theme!

D. Woods

Yo-Yo

As outlined in my previous post, "Go Hard or Go Home" about the nature of costume parties, having one in an outdoor setting can leave you feeling like a jackass:

The most successful theme parties were conducted by household occupants in which all or a majority of the roomates were involved. It is much more fun to get everyone in on the act when the household is in consensus, thus easier to enforce mandatory dress status. One of the rooms can be blocked off for dressing purposes, and when there are more people in on the fun, wardrobe can be borrowed, exchanged, and easily consulted with.
When a theme party is thrown in a club or at a third party's house whose involvement is questionable, people will become easily embarrassed and chicken out. Or they'd rather dress up and impress the opposite gender than go all out with the costume. And you, like myself this past weekend, will be left all by your lonely in a time warp.

Yo Gabba Gabba Time!!!

Yo Gabba Gabba with (Hector Jimenez)



(For added enjoyment, put one in the air before you watch this!)


If you love Yo Gabba Gabba!, you have small children or like to smoke nugs the size of small children, either way it's highly entertaining. Aside from from indie bands rocking the stage about having pajama parties and, my personal favorite, Biz Markie's beat of the day, they have life lessons that some adults I know could benefit from.



Over the weekend, Bam and I took Kahlil to Amoeba on Sunset to watch Yo Gabba Gabba LIVE! The place was packed with tiny tots on shoulders bobbing and dancing to DJ Lance Rock and I was about to burst at the sight of all the cuteness. It truly made me enjoy music again, especially as a jaded music journalist who hates large crowds, is too short to see anything, thus won't settle for anything less than VIP.


Here are some videos and (blurry) photos that captured how crazy and fun the show was.

Happy Halloween